Niger’s defense dilemma: can anyone still trace the men, contracts and money behind the CFPD and Domol Leydi?

A decree was signed. Billions of CFA francs suddenly became potentially available. A new defense architecture took shape. Responsibilities changed hands. And then, a second mobilization mechanism appeared.

Examined one by one, these events can be filed away as routine administrative or military decisions. Examined together, they raise a far more uncomfortable question: who really controls the manpower, the resources and the levers of national defense in Niger and is anyone in a position to account for them?

Three of the most powerful figures in the country sit at the crossroads of that question: General Abdourahamane Tiani, General Salifou Mody and former prime minister Lamine Zeine. At the centre of the file are the Command of Protection and Development Forces (CFPD) and, more recently, the community self-defense organizations known as Domol Leydi. Beneath both lies a third, less visible but decisive issue: money.

A decree in May 2024 and a question that still has no answer

On 9 May 2024, decree No. 2024-309/P/CNSP/MDN formally established the Command of Protection and Development Forces. The move was anything but symbolic. The new body was designed to help protect mining and oil sites, strategic infrastructure, corridors and several development projects. The text presented it as an instrument meant to secure extractive resources, the WAPCO pipeline, CNPC-NP, SORAZ and key strategic corridors.

The decree also lays out a very specific financial mechanism, and that is where the file changes scale. A military force does not run on manpower and orders alone. It requires equipment, transport, food, logistics, maintenance and, above all, predictable funding. The decree organises precisely that machinery.

The arithmetic behind the 12,000 FCFA daily rate

Article 28 of the decree states that company contributions are collected on the basis of contracts concluded with the state, and that a single standby allowance is paid back to the CFPD according to the troop numbers actually achieved. The minimum value is set at 12,000 FCFA per man per day. The text also breaks that envelope into several components: a daily duty allowance, food, hygiene, operations and maintenance.

On a working hypothesis of 5,000 men, the order of magnitude reaches roughly 60 million FCFA a day close to 1.8 billion per month and about 21.9 billion over a full year.

One qualification is essential. This is a projection calculated from the theoretical troop strength and the mechanism written into the decree. It is not proof that any such sum was ever collected. That is exactly why scrutiny is necessary.

The real question is not simply how much the system could generate. It is far more precise: how much was actually committed? How much was paid? For how many men? For which missions? And to whom?

The force is real, but does it match the blueprint?

It would be too easy to dismiss the CFPD as an abandoned structure. In 2026, Defense Minister Salifou Mody stated publicly that personnel of the Protection and Development Force were deployed to secure economic installations, including posts linked to the pipeline.

The problem is therefore more complex. The CFPD exists. It is officially part of the defense architecture. It carries out certain missions. But another question lingers: does its day-to-day operation fully match the architecture, the troop levels and the financial mechanism originally planned?

This is where administrative and financial records become decisive. Between planned strength and deployed strength, between sums that could theoretically be mobilized and sums actually disbursed, the gap can be considerable. And that gap has to be documented.

Following the money: who authorizes, who releases, who blocks

The financing of the CFPD has been at the heart of tensions between different poles of power. One particularly sensitive element concerns an instruction attributed to President Tiani aimed at not applying certain financial provisions of the mechanism. At this stage, no public document formally establishes such an instruction.

But if it were confirmed, the implications would stretch well beyond an administrative difficulty. It would raise a major institutional question: how can a body created by decree function when some of its financial provisions are deliberately prevented or delayed? The question carries extra weight because the decree itself organises the CFPD’s resources and their use.

Defense wants resources, finance wants control

The presumed conflict then takes on a wider dimension. On one side, the defense establishment seeks the means needed for its missions. On the other, the ministry in charge of finance must control public resources and how they are used. Above both sits the political authority that arbitrates.

That articulation deserves examination. In a strongly centralised defense system, controlling resources also means controlling operational capacity. Whoever holds the credits holds part of the means. Whoever holds the troop numbers holds another part of the power. And whoever arbitrates between the two holds the ultimate lever.

A prime minister who kept his office but lost the treasury

In January 2026, Lamine Zeine lost the Economy and Finance portfolio while remaining prime minister. The shift deserves attention, because it alters the distribution of levers without necessarily altering the broader political balance.

The question then becomes: why strip Zeine of direct control over the finances while keeping him at the head of the government? Elements of the case indicate that General Mody later considered taking the head of the government, with the possibility of combining that role with Defense. That prospect is not established by the public documents available.

If it were confirmed, however, it would reveal a much deeper stakes: the concentration in the same hands of the two principal levers of state power defense and the premiership.

Domol Leydi enters the picture

Then comes another stage. In late 2025, Niger adopted an ordinance instituting general mobilization. The authorities present it as a mechanism allowing the country to move from a state of peace to a state of war, and to mobilize the human, material and financial resources needed to defend the homeland.

Within that framework, community self-defense organizations known as Domol Leydi emerged. In April 2026, the defense minister himself explained that these organizations must work under the control and supervision of the defense and security forces. Officially, the mechanism follows a security logic.

Yet its arrival raises a strategic question: why multiply mobilization and protection mechanisms when a specialised command such as the CFPD already exists? The missions are not identical. The CFPD is a military structure tasked in particular with protecting strategic interests. Domol Leydi belongs more to a logic of territorial mobilization and community self-defense. But both meet on common ground: men, security, resources and the chain of command.

Overlapping mandates and a single chain of command

From that point, one question becomes unavoidable: where does the role of the CFPD stop and where does that of Domol Leydi begin? Who recruits? Who trains? Who equips? Who funds? Who issues the orders? Who controls the men? And above all, who answers politically and legally when something goes wrong?

These are not secondary concerns. The more structures a state adds in the security field, the more essential clarity of command becomes. Sovereignty is not measured only by the number of soldiers mobilized. It is also measured by the state’s ability to know who commands whom, with what means and under what oversight.

Troop numbers: the figure that decides everything

This may be one of the keys to the whole file. The CFPD’s financial mechanism is calculated according to the troop strength actually achieved. That turns an apparently technical detail into a politically fundamental question: how many men were genuinely deployed, and how many actually generated expenditure under the mechanism?

The answer should be traceable in administrative records: strength returns, mission orders, attendance sheets, security contracts, expenditure commitments, payment orders and execution reports. Without those documents, the billions remain projections. With them, it becomes possible to reconstruct the financial reality of the mechanism precisely.

Contracts with companies: the paper trail that would settle it

The decree provides that company contributions rest on contracts established between those businesses and the state. That provision opens another line of inquiry. Which companies signed such contracts? What amounts were agreed? What security services were planned? How many personnel were to be assigned to each site? Were the services actually delivered? Were the corresponding sums paid in full?

And, crucially, which administration oversees that financial chain? The answers would determine whether this is a simple operational problem or a far more serious dysfunction.

When security spending becomes a question of power

At this point the file stops being a matter of a single decree. It touches the very structure of power. The CFPD concentrates men and missions. Companies may contribute to its funding under the planned mechanism. The defense ministry supervises the operational side. Finance necessarily intervenes in the public resource chain. The premiership is another coordination hub. And the presidency retains supreme political authority.

In other words, several essential levers intersect around one mechanism. That is precisely what makes opacity so troubling.

High treason is a heavy legal category

The term high treason carries enormous weight. It cannot be used casually to describe a political conflict or a poor administrative decision. Nigerien law has historically tied the notion to particularly grave attacks on the fundamental interests of the state. The 2010 Constitution, for instance, referred to breach of oath, certain serious human rights violations, the fraudulent cession of part of the territory, or the compromising of national interests in the management of natural resources.

The current institutional situation must nonetheless be assessed in light of the Charter of Refoundation, now the fundamental text governing public authorities during this period.

The journalistic issue, then, is not to declare that high treason has already occurred. The real question is more demanding: if public officials knowingly diverted, paralysed or manipulated a strategic defense mechanism for personal or factional interests, what legal and institutional consequences could follow? Only evidence can settle that.

The scenario that would be hardest to explain

Here lies the core of the affair. A state facing a major security threat creates a mechanism to protect its strategic resources. A financial mechanism is designed. Troops must be mobilized. Companies are called on to contribute.

If, at the same time, personal or institutional rivalries were determining who receives the means, who controls them, or who can block their implementation, then the problem would no longer be merely administrative. It would touch directly on the governance of national defense. That hypothesis still has to be demonstrated — through documents, corroborating testimony and financial traceability.

Documents will speak louder than declarations

The authorities can talk about sovereignty. Military officials can talk about mobilization. Official statements can talk about security. But the documents will tell a different story: the story of the spending actually carried out.

The comparison will have to be made between announced strength and real strength; planned missions and executed missions; theoretical amounts and payments actually made; contracts signed and services genuinely delivered; structures announced and how they truly function. It is that confrontation that will establish the real scale of the file.

The question that remains open

The CFPD-Domol Leydi affair does not, on its own, establish an accusation of high treason. But it raises enough questions to justify a thorough examination of the chain of command, the troop numbers, the contracts and, above all, the financial flows.

When a defense mechanism is tied to potentially considerable resources, the stakes cannot be limited to who commands the men. It is also necessary to know who controls the money, who controls the contracts, who verifies troop numbers, who checks the services delivered, who can block or release resources, and who is ultimately accountable for their use.

That may be the real knot of the affair. And if documentary evidence were to show that private interests had indeed taken precedence over the interests of national defense, the question would no longer be a simple standoff between officials. It would become a question of state.

In national defense, diverting resources, manipulating structures or deliberately neutralising a strategic mechanism would not be a mere quarrel over power. It would potentially be a grave attack on the fundamental interests of the nation.

For now, established facts, claims made in the case and hypotheses must be carefully distinguished. But one thing is certain: the only way to lift the veil will be to follow the men, the orders, the contracts and, above all, the money.

By Daniel Mbami — Politique & Sécurité

By Daniel Mbami — Politique & Sécurité